Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?
by Thermopyle
Summary: A story which, perhaps, answers a question which has plagued us from the very beginning. Surprise crossover. Renamed from A Very Tragic Story, some fixes made.


Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?   
by Thermopyle (thermopyle@tds.net)   
  
Disclaimers at the bottom.   
  
Sign language portrayed as .   
  
  
#####   
  
His heartbeat was loud and fast, each pulse of blood shooting down veins   
and making his whole body throb as if receiving a barrage of physical   
blows. His breathing labored, he sucked air in and out of his lungs as   
fast as he could, gasping desperately as he attempted to recover from   
the latest attack. The girls were both unconscious upon the road,   
knocked out before they could even begin to respond to this new threat.   
His brother stood near their prone forms, hovering protectively over   
them, his face showing frustration at not being able to do anything but   
glare hatefully at the person who'd hurt them.   
  
She had appeared out of nowhere, having either been invisible and   
waiting for them, or teleporting to their location from somewhere else.   
He wasn't capable of doing either and he was the magic user of the   
group. He didn't even know what the power levels involved in such   
abilities were, but he was quite sure that she was strong enough to have   
killed him and the girls easily if she had wished to.   
  
The first attack had been a complete surprise. One instant the road   
ahead of them was clear, the next they were blocked by a woman and a   
fireball was streaking towards him. He managed to bring an arm up to   
shield himself before it hit, but it still knocked him to the side,   
setting the sleeve of his shirt on fire as well as singing his hair.   
The material of his shirt had melted right into his skin and every time   
he moved now he could feel the wet, sticky skin of his burnt forearm   
peeling and tugging itself free of the muscles that lie beneath.   
  
With him out of the way, the next blast, some kind of concussive magic,   
slammed into the ground right in front of the two girls. They didn't   
react in time and the explosion of high pressure smashed into them like   
a tsunami. Their limp forms were thrown backwards thirty feet, tumbling   
uncontrollably across the hard-packed dirt of the road. Neither of them   
got back up.   
  
When he managed to get back up, he saw his brother advancing upon their   
attacker, his face twisted into a snarl of rage. Their attacker was   
wearing a brown cloak with the cowl hiding most of her features. He   
guessed it was a girl, anyway, from the hairless cheeks and chin, and   
the ruby-colored lips that couldn't be a natural shade. A twitch of the   
lips betrayed amusement and just before his brother reached her, she   
disappeared.   
  
"So stupid," she said.   
  
They both turned towards her voice to see that she was near the girls   
now, another globe of rapidly expanding magic appearing within the   
manicured, delicate-looking hand that peaked out from within her   
voluminous sleeves. A flick of the wrist sent it shooting at the girls,   
once again throwing them away from the blast even though their attacker   
wasn't affected by the spell at all.   
  
As his brother moved to cover the girls, he began throwing all of the   
magic at his disposal towards the cloaked sorceress, ignoring the   
apparent futility of his actions as she simply teleported away from each   
attack with ease. His brother reached the girls but was unable to help;   
his skills were useless unless the woman attacked him directly and her   
unwillingness to do so indicated that she knew that. Instead, she   
ignored his brother and the girls, choosing instead to give him the   
benefit of her attention.   
  
At first she simply evaded his attacks, teleporting about him to random   
locations to keep him from hitting her, but she soon began to resume the   
offensive. Each dodged spell was followed by one of her own infuriating   
attacks. It was obvious that she was just toying with him, everything   
she threw at him either missed narrowly or was low-powered enough that   
he could get back up after taking the blow. She was ensuring that he   
couldn't get close to his brother or the girls, however, by knocking him   
back in the other direction whenever he tried to approach them.   
  
After several minutes of this, his strength depleted not only by each   
hit taken but by all the power he was expending as well, he collapsed to   
his knees wearily, glaring defiance at the woman even though he knew it   
to be a useless gesture, just like all his attacks had been.   
  
She waited a moment, then disappeared again, rematerializing thirty feet   
up and hovering without any visible means of support. Something else he   
didn't know how to do.   
  
"So, this is all you have?" she asked. "I expected more. What a   
disappointment. Very well, let's end this." So saying, she pointed one   
arm towards his brother tossed a spell at him, the first direct attack   
upon him since the battle began. The feel of the spell was completely   
unfamiliar, filled with chaotic malevolence. He had no idea what it   
was, but if she'd avoided his brother this whole time, only to cast   
something at him now...   
  
"Look out!" he yelled, uselessly, trying to stand. His brother wouldn't   
move, he knew, because if he did then the girls would take the blow   
instead.   
  
With a big grin on his face, his brother stood up straight, prepared to   
receive the blast. The triumphant look quickly faded when it hit and   
his reaction to the magic began. Instead of quickly switching to   
another body, a monstrous body with immense strength and physical   
abilities, the change was slow and tortuous. The transformation wasn't   
uniform, either, as his body began to warp itself into an increasingly   
bizarre shape. His head and chest bulged out, developing into one   
shape, as his arms twisted into another, and his lower body another yet,   
the melting and reforming of his body fluid and ongoing, speeding up as   
it went. From his brother's screams, it was extremely, incredibly   
painful.   
  
He staggered to his feet and began stumbling towards his brother as best   
he could despite the burns all over his body, the bruises and aching   
bones. His beloved older brother, who'd done so much for him, needed   
his help.   
  
"I don't think so," said the woman's voice. He twisted about in fear,   
looking towards the sky to see her trace a circle in the air before her,   
a trail of black fire following her extended finger's motions. When the   
circle was complete a loud crackling noise became audible, sparks of   
lightning flaring about the rim of fire. He didn't know how she'd done   
it, but inside the circle was a sky of a different color, and a valley   
of strange lakes was visible through it. With a light push, the disc   
was sent towards his still-screaming brother, expanding as it dropped   
down upon him. His brother disappeared inside it, dropping down into   
the valley below, and the portal folded itself in half, like an eyelid   
blinking, and disappeared.   
  
His brother was gone.   
  
First he felt disbelief, his mind insisting that it wasn't possible, it   
couldn't have happened. His brother hadn't just been sent through some   
kind of weird portal to another place, possibly to his death.   
Impossible.   
  
As he stared at the empty patch of land, however, his feelings changed.   
It was possible. It had happened. His brother was gone, and without   
magic he would have no way to return. He refused to accept that the   
elder boy was dead, however; instead, he was waiting somewhere beyond   
sight and sound, waiting for his younger brother to come to his rescue   
for once.   
  
The woman's light, mocking laughter changed his feelings to rage, and   
power, far beyond anything he'd ever known, began to fill him. His   
brother needed him, and this bitch was in the way.   
  
Her mistake.   
  
#####   
  
Elsewhere, a fat, baldheaded man looked to the sky as a strange   
crackling noise was suddenly heard. A black rip appeared, like a   
portion of space itself, and out dropped some...thing the likes of which   
he had never seen, thrashing about as it fell. It landed where expected   
and he sighed, then moved to record the day's events, and what exactly   
he had just seen.   
  
How tragic.   
  
#####   
  
Later:   
  
Another rip appeared, this one at ground level and in a safe location   
away from the pools, and three people stepped out. The first was a man,   
and the second two were both women. With a short gesture from the man,   
the portal disappeared. Then he closed his eyes for a brief moment,   
before opening them and letting a relieved smile appear on his face.   
  
"That way!" he said, pointing eastwards. "My brother is that way."   
  
The two girls, both with happy smiles upon their faces, were relieved at   
having found their lost love. Together the three set off to find him.   
  
#####   
  
Ranma and Happousai both sat in the back yard of the Tendou home, mouths   
open wide in astonishment, although at different things, to be sure.   
The old man's eyes were filled with tears of pride and happiness, his   
joy readily apparent. Ranma's eyes were just full of stunned   
incomprehension.   
  
"I... I'm so PROUD!" said Happousai. "I knew he'd come around one day,   
but this, this is unexpected! To think that he would not only come to   
love the name I'd given him, but refuse to accept another from two   
beautiful, lovely women!"   
  
Ranma just watched in silence as Pantyhose Tarou ran past in his cursed   
form, two women and a man in close pursuit. The women were both waving   
whips around, their bodies moving in interesting ways, bouncing in one   
direction and then another as they ran with their arms swinging. The   
man ran beside them, absently dodging the whips that kept cracking the   
air nearby, his arms spread as he chased Tarou with disturbing   
eagerness. Pantyhose was in obvious need of help but the situation was   
just too ridiculous for Ranma to do anything but watch silently as the   
troupe ran past. What an unexpected sight.   
  
Again they came, Pantyhose Tarou still waving his signs about   
frantically, the three people right on his heels, shouting their pleas   
as they went.   
  
"Carrot!"   
"Carrot, come back!"   
"Brother! I've come to rescue you!"   
flip   
  
The End.   
  
Author notes: Did anybody not see this coming? I wrote it based on the   
memories of the two volumes of Sorcerer Hunters I read almost a year ago   
now, so I pretty much made up all the magic related stuff, letting it   
work out exactly as I wanted it to with no regard for the magic system   
of the real story.   
  
So, this is my attempt to answer how the spring that Pantyhose Taro was   
dunked into was created. Carrot's monster form looks quite a bit like   
Taro's, I think, so it seems like the obvious explanation. It seems far   
more likely than some group of random monsters diving into a spring   
while holding onto each other, anyway.   
  
Sorcerer Hunters is by Satoru Akahori. Ranma is by Rumiko Takahashi. I   
own neither series, nor the characters contained within.


End file.
